Friday, April 17, 2009

Professor Charles here again, with the second of my installments on the parallels between writing effective advertising and writing compelling novels.

Rick’s post (below) on revision made me revise my plans. Instead of posting about branding and character development, I want to ramble on a bit about micro-level revision.

When most folks talk about the revision process, they are usually talking about how they need to tweak the entire manuscript to ensure that it’s all going in the right direction—do I add a chapter here to explain Lord Philby’s obsession with marsupials, do I remove Aunt Glenda since, other than the one scene in the copper smelting plant she adds little to the plot, do I give Marvin an adorable obsessive compulsive trait in addition to his inability to conjugate French past-tense verbs? These are all good questions and work at this level is essential, but what I’m talking about are much smaller decisions—do I say ottoman or footstool, did he push the door open or was it more of a shove, did her eyes glisten or just water up?

Billboard ads seem so last century, but after almost 100 years they remain amazingly effective. One of the toughest assignments in advertising is to come up with an effective billboard campaign. What makes it so tough is that you have a blink to make an impact, a tiny handful of words—seven or so, tops—to get the message out there. Often, but not always, you get a good picture to work with and if you’re lucky, a well-known logo that can cut down what has to be said in words. I have written many times about how long it might take me to write a chapter in a book, but it’s no exaggeration to say that I have spent 20+ hours trying to come up with just the right set of words for single billboard. Sometimes you hit on the right combination in an hour, but the norm is much longer, and it’s all because of word choices.

Now authors make word choices every two seconds, but I submit that when you are writing an ad—a billboard, a print ad, a web banner, a point-of-sale poster—those word choices are critical to the success of the writing. In a novel you might have 90,000 words. If you sweated every word you’d never get it done. Yes, you think about them, but does any author have the time—or the need—to explore alternative word choices and phrasing for every single word, every single time? Sometimes you just have to open the damn door.

When you ponder word choices on a micro level, you get to explore all the neat denotations and connotations, weighing this word over that one, these two together versus these two, these three, not these three. It’s great fun, intellectually stimulating and painfully slow. I don’t suggest it as a way to approach your novel since you’ll never get it done (hmmm…good excuse, though), but when you have a scene that is just not working or a character who remains flat on the page, get down to the micro level and I bet you’ll see some progress.

So here’s your assignment—come up with a 5 billboard campaign for the manuscript you are currently working on. That’s 5 different billboards that sell your particular story (not you, the story), using no more than 7 words per billboard. Yes, you can use images. Here’s an example using the book I’m writing. It might go something like this:

[Image - Top down photo of the inside of a dresser drawer. Objects on the top of the dresser and inside make it clear it’s an older man’s dresser. Mixed in with the shirts and suspenders and old monogrammed hankies is a small black bag, and spilling out of this bag are un-mounted jewels. And just visible under the bag is the pistol grip of a handgun and a pair of black leather gloves. Upper right side of the billboard is an image of the book cover.]

[Headline] He’s not your typical grandfather.

You may not know anything about the book—and you don’t—but I bet you have some questions about this old man. Okay, it’s not brilliant, but you get the idea. Please post your billboards in the comment section. And trust me on this, writing billboards is harder than it sounds.

7 comments:

I am definately going to do this! In the meantime, what I think makes my trailer for Valley of the Lost (go to Youtube and search on Valley of the Lost Delany) is that it's so short. 38 seconds. Pow, and it's over. Much, much better than many trailers I've seen that are a lot longer.

Okay, here's my billboard design for the next novel, The Fallen One -- or in Italian, La Traviata:

On the lefthand side, a blackened stage. Photo of obvious opera singer wearing a white gown, lying on her side at the end of the big death scene. On the right the image morphs into a photo of the dead body of a man dumped among the garbage in a darkened alley.

The copy is (typeset in white, either Interstate Black or Geoslab Extra Bold -- sorry, the designer in me has to get in on the action) "Sometimes opera doesn't stay on the stage..."

Lower right hand corner has the book's details ("Available now", etc.) and the cover, which will obviously have to be bright or have a glow around it otherwise it will be lost in the images. Sorry... Design moment again.

Gold Digger: The billboard if sull of the iconic black and white photo of the line of people struggling up the Golden Staircase to the Chilkoot pass (you know the picture). Half the picture is overlaid by colour photo of a huge woman's hat - red, ostrich feather, lace and satin. Caption "There is more than one type of gold rush".

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Rick Blechta writes on Tuesdays

Barbara Fradkin writes on alternate Wednesdays

Sybil Johnson writes on Alternate Wednesdays

John Corrigan writes on alternate Thursdays

Donis Casey writes on alternate Thursdays

Charlotte Hinger writes on alternate Fridays

Frankie Bailey writes on Alternate Fridays

Vicki Delany writes on the second weekend of every month

Mario Acevedo writes on the 4th Saturday of each month

Aline Templeton

Aline Templeton lives in Edinburgh in a house with a balcony overlooking the beautiful city skyline. Her series featuring DI Marjory Fleming is set in beautiful Galloway, in South-west Scotland. alinetempleton.co.uk

Marianne Wheelaghan

Marianne is from Edinburgh. She left home at seventeen. After a heap of travelling, which included living in Kiribati, the third most remote country in the world, she ended back in Edinburgh where she still lives very happily. Her crime mysteries feature DS Louisa Townsend, The Scottish Lady Detective, and are mostly set in the Pacific. Read more about Marianne and her books on her blog: www.mariannewheelaghan.co.uk and at @MWheelaghan

Rick Blechta

Rick has two passions in life, mysteries and music, and his thrillers contain liberal doses of both. He has two upcoming releases, Roses for a Diva, his sequel to The Fallen One, for Dundurn Press, and for Orca’s Rapid Reads series, The Boom Room, a second book featuring detectives Pratt & Ellis. You can learn more about what he’s up to at www.rickblechta.com. From the musical side, Rick leads a classic soul band in Toronto. Check out SOULidifiedband.com. And lastly, being a former line cook with an interest in all things culinary, he has a blog dedicated to food: A Man for All Seasonings.

Barbara Fradkin

Barbara Fradkin is a retired psychologist with a fascination for how we turn bad. Her dark short stories haunt the Ladies Killing Circle anthologies, but she is best known for her award-winning series featuring the quixotic, exasperating Ottawa Police Inspector Michael Green, published by Dundurn Press. The ninth book, The Whisper of Legends, was published in April 2013. Visit Barbara at barbarafradkin.com.

Sybil Johnson

Sybil Johnson’s love affair with reading began in kindergarten with “The Three Little Pigs.” Visits to the library introduced her to Encyclopedia Brown, Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle and a host of other characters. Fast forward to college where she continued reading while studying Computer Science. After a rewarding career in the computer industry, Sybil decided to try her hand at writing mysteries. Her short fiction has appeared in Mysterical-E and Spinetingler Magazine, among others. Originally from the Pacific Northwest, she now lives in Southern California where she enjoys tole painting, studying ancient languages and spending time with friends and family. Find her at www.authorsybiljohnson.com.

John R Corrigan

John R. Corrigan is D.A. Keeley, author of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Agent Peyton Cote series, which is set along the Maine-Canada border. Bitter Crossing (summer 2014) will be the first of at least three novels in the series. Born in Augusta, Maine, he lives with his wife and three daughters at Northfield Mount Hermon School in western Massachusetts, where he is English department chair, a teacher, a hockey coach, and may very well be the only mystery writer in North America who also serves as a dorm parent to 50 teenage girls. A Mainer through and through, he tries to get to Old Orchard Beach, Maine, as often as possible. You can see what he's up to by visiting www.amazon.com/author/DAKeeley or dakeeleyauthor.blogspot.com or on Twitter (@DAKeeleyAuthor).

Donis Casey

Donis is the author of six Alafair Tucker Mysteries. Her award-winning series, featuring the sleuthing mother of ten children, is set in Oklahoma during the booming 1910s. Donis is a former teacher, academic librarian, and entrepreneur. She lives in Tempe, AZ, with her husband, poet Donald Koozer. The latest Alafair Tucker novel, The Wrong Hill to Die On (Poisoned Pen Press, 2012), is available in paper or electronic format wherever books are sold. Readers can enjoy the first chapter of each book on her web site at www.doniscasey.com.

Frankie Bailey

Frankie Y. Bailey is a criminal justice professor who focuses on crime, history, and American culture. Her current project is a book about dress, appearance, and criminal justice. Her mystery series featuring crime historian Lizzie Stuart is set mainly in the South. Her near-future police procedural series featuring Detective Hannah McCabe is set in Albany, New York. Visit Frankie at frankieybailey.com.

Charlotte Hinger

Charlotte Hinger is a novelist and Western Kansas historian. Convinced that mystery writing and historical investigation go hand in hand, she now applies her MA in history to academic articles and her depraved imagination to the Lottie Albright series for Poisoned Pen Press. charlottehinger.com

Vicki Delany/Eva Gates

Vicki Delany is one of Canada’s most prolific and varied crime writers. She is the author of more than 25 books, including the Sherlock Holmes Bookshop series, the Year Round Christmas cozy series, the Constable Molly Smith books, standalone novels of suspense, the Klondike Gold Rush series, and novellas for adult literacy. As Eva Gates, she is the author of the national bestselling Lighthouse Library cozy series from Penguin. Find Vicki at www.vickidelany.com and on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/evagatesauthor/

Mario Acevedo

Mario Acevedo is the author of the Felix Gomez detective-vampire series. His short fiction is included in the anthologies, You Don’t Have A Clue: Latino Mystery Stories for Teens and Hit List: The Best of Latino Mystery, and in Modern Drunkard Magazine. Mario lives with a dog in Denver, CO. His website is marioacevedo.com.